China is known for their vigorous education at all grade levels, but high school is an especially grueling time for Chinese students. Discipline is a huge part of Chinese lifestyle and this introduced at an early age and drilled in through high school, giving students a true taste of real life in China. While the program may be a nightmare to those in the Western world, many Chinese students see it as a necessary step to prep them for university and a successful career.

1. Good luck getting there. In China, only the primary school (grades 1-9) are required. High school is three years long with the senior year being the most strenuous in terms of academics. For Chinese students outside of major cities, there is a very low chance they will attend high school and instead opt for working in agriculture or moving to cities to work in factories. By some Chinese families high school is seen as a waste of time since a student could be out working instead of getting an education. Less than 35% of students in China enter high school.
2. Physical activity isn’t a fun gym class. In the U.S., gym class may consist of playing recreational basketball, a dance class, or playing a competitive team sport. Of course if you don’t excel in these areas, it isn’t the end of the world. Worst case scenario, you’re booted from the team or sit on the bench. In China, it’s a different story. On top of their regular physical activity (which can vary from 2-4 hours a week), Chinese students must pass a strenuous boot camp-style course that lasts 2-3 weeks prior to the school year. While it isn’t as brutal as U.S. Army boot camps, it is a course that students must prep for in the months leading up to it.
3. Study hall is practically required. Maybe study hall is an optional class for Westerners, or a period where kids goof off while in the library. In China, study hall is almost mandatory. While there are no set rules on how often a student must attend study hall or after hours courses, it is vital to a student’s academic career due to the large amount of work. Unless you are Doogie Howser, you’re probably going to need extra time in the class room once you see the 3-4 hours of nightly homework that is given.
4. One word – the Gaokao. The Gaokao is the Chinese version of the SAT or ACT exams. Unlike these tests, the Gaokao doesn’t play a single role in determining what caliber of university a student attends. Gaokao is responsible for a student’s future. It decides where the student will be accepted at university. There’s no extracurricular activities or grades involved, just Gaokao. The Chinese government doesn’t care where you volunteered or how many debates you won, they just want to send those who test well to the top universities and utilize them for careers in the future.
5. You can forget about having a high school sweetheart. As studying intensifies for seniors preparing to take the Gaokao, students are expected to focus only on school work and scoring as high as possible on the exam. Having a boyfriend or girlfriend is seen as a distraction from the Gaokao and students are reprimanded if they’re seen spending too much time with the opposite sex or exchanging subtle PDA in the hallways such as holding hands. Of course, with hours of homework a night, who has time to bother thinking about a companion? The Chinese want to keep it that way.
6. Verbal abuse is the norm. If you make it to high school, you’re probably wealthy or live in a large city where education is seen as an opportunity to be seized. While corporal punishment is not allowed, verbal abuse and humiliation is. While most Chinese students are accustomed to this treatment by the time they reach their middle and late teens, it can still have an effect on their behavior, school performance and self-confidence. The teenage years are usually awkward and while Chinese teens don’t deal with the silly distractions Western teens face, they are still growing into their own skin. This verbal abuse is seen as the norm (and practiced as such), and students must take it or risk expulsion.
7. When it comes to science class, you can look, but never touch. Even if your high school days were a drag, you probably remember dissecting a frog. If it’s an experiment day in science class, you can count on a little fun that day, right? Not in China. Chinese students can view experiments on a video, but they can never partake in them. How this is supposed teach a lesson we aren’t exactly sure, but the Chinese have a strict rule that prevents science classes from conducting any experiments on school turf. Instead, a TV is brought in and students watch the experiment being performed. Thrilling!
8. It’s like you’re in boarding school only minus the fun. Because Gaokao is such an intense exam, the last three months of high school usually involve a boarding school-like mentality for students. This often involves a student staying at school for 12 hours a day, attending extra courses on the weekend or with a private tutor to improve their chances of scoring high on the Gaokao.
9. You will run with the same crowd…your entire school career. Chinese students are placed in a class when they begin school in grade 1 and remain with this same group of kids through their senior year when taking the Gaokao. So if high school isn’t brutal enough, imagine living it with the same 30-40 kids you’ve known your entire life. With loads of school work, straight-from-the-book lectures, little to no class participation and a looming test, a mix of new students might make the high school lifestyle of a Chinese student tolerable. Instead they’re stuck with the same kids and build a serious competitive nature to outdo each other.
10. You don’t have to resort to cheating. In the U.S., two tests – the SAT and ACT are accepted as part, yet not all of your college application. Because the Gaokao weighs so heavily on a student’s future, students, teachers and even parents have been caught cheating in order to improve test scores. It’s not only students and faculty to do cartwheels to prep for the Gaokao, but also parents, who promise new cars and other lavish gifts if a student does well on the test. In early January 2010, a group of teachers and parents were thrown in jail for helping students cheat using wireless earpieces and scanners.

High school students in China take academics seriously for the most part. While few have the opportunity to attend high school, even less will enter university. In 2007, about 10 million students took the Gaokao in hopes of landing one of 5.7 million availability spots at universities throughout China.